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It’s not destroying the infrastructure, it’s abandoning it. The article states that prior to this ruling they’re required to maintain or replace with comparable
by bm1362 9y ago
It’s not destroying the infrastructure, it’s abandoning it. The article states that prior to this ruling they’re required to maintain or replace with comparable functionality for existing copper customers.
This ruling let’s them abandon them altogether from what I gathered.
- maltalex 9y agoOk, but there are still paying customers on the end of that infrastructure. Are they not profitable enough?
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- Rovanion 9y agoSince they have local monopolies they can trust they will regain the user but on infrastructure that is cheaper to maintain.
- andrewtbham 9y agoMy understanding is rural access is often unprofitable. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Service_Fund https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Service_Fund
- imglorp 9y agoYet we've been paying into this fund decades, which was supposed to pay for rural access. Now, Relieving the telcos of this obligation despite them not completing universal access amounts to corporate welfare for those poor starving giants. Then there's E911. Of a bigger concern in rural areas will be losing access to 911. A lot of homes still keep landlines just for the 911 capabilities. Under the old rules the carriers had to demonstrate that customers would still have access to reliable 911, but it seems the carriers can now walk away without worrying about this. This is also a health and safety issue.
- fencepost 9y agoThe sparsely populated rural western states will lose the ability to call 911, but maybe it won't matter so much - with a big percentage of those small rural hospitals that depend on part on Medicaid money going under, anyone needing emergency medical treatment is probably going to be looking at a minimum time of 2-3 hours anyway so what's an extra hour or two? But you can count on one thing: "Thanks, Obama!"
- abalashov 9y agoNo, not past a certain point of diminishing returns.
- sitkack 9y agoThings that are utilities need to widely available. Power, electricty, water, etc. We grant monopoly status to corporations in exchange for fixed profits and guaranteed service even where not profitable. If we didn't do this, they would have block by block pricing and wouldn't serve areas for arbitrary "reasons" Yet they still continue to shake the people down. I don't think corporations should run anything last mile. The temptation is just too great.
- gjjrfcbugxbhf 9y agoMaybe they should compete for the service contracts - but even then cost benefit should compare with insourced provision.
- Someone 9y agoI would guess mining the copper would be worth it, unless this causes a huge price drop (and maybe not even then. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metal_theft https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metal_theft: ”Some have argued that the "genie is out of the bottle" now and drops in commodity prices will not result in corresponding drops in thefts. In fact, it is possible that thefts may actually increase to compensate for the loss in value.[citation needed]”